As it turns out, former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor Edward Snowden didn’t just take documents during his time at Booz Allen Hamilton in 2013; he also grabbed some while working for Dell in April 2012. Snowden worked for Dell from 2009 until early 2013.

According to Reuters, which cited “US officials and other sources familiar with the matter,” Snowden now appears to have begun exfiltrating information a year earlier than previously believed.

Reuters' sources also said that Snowden took documents pertaining to “eavesdropping programs run by the NSA and Britain's Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), and left an electronic footprint indicating when he accessed the documents.” Those documents could include previously published information Ars reported on concerning the secret British spy agency.

After leaving Dell in early 2013, Snowden began working for Booz Allen Hamilton as a systems administrator. Recently, Booz Allen announced that it had fired around 90 percent of its system administrators in response to Snowden’s actions.

As Reuters also noted, “It is not clear whether Dell has taken similar steps.”

"We are honoring our customer's request that we not comment on this matter," David Frink, a Dell spokesman, told the news agency. The “customer” is believed to be the NSA.

Why Booz Allen Hamilton fired 90% of their administrators ? Did they los all government contracts or they had to vent their anger on some innocent people. Hey, Nazis used to shoot entire villages if one farmer was caught hiding a Jew.

Ok, I'll ask the question. Why did a contractor at Dell have access to this kind of information?

He was providing support for the servers that contained the documents?

In any case, this makes Snowden look more like a criminal than a hero if he was in fact stealing private file data from a customer's machine.

Not at all. I'm sure the U.S. government would insist that "the ends justify the means" in regards to spying. Using their criteria a measuring stick, and given all the useful information Snowden has provided to the general public, I'd say the ends justify the means.

Ok, I'll ask the question. Why did a contractor at Dell have access to this kind of information?

He was providing support for the servers that contained the documents?

In any case, this makes Snowden look more like a criminal than a hero if he was in fact stealing private file data from a customer's machine.

Why were they storing top secret data in a server serviced by Dell technicians, and in a form that those technicians could decrypt? No matter Snowden's actions, seems pretty fishy.

On that note, the biggest argument against the NSA's safeguards against abuse is that Snowden was able to access any of the things he accessed. He shouldn't have had access, and even if he did, alarms should've started ringing when a new hire started accessing top-secret material. If a sysadmin can access and download these documents that have nothing to do with his job description, what kind of abuses are occurring among your rank and file analysts, who are expected to be accessing sensitive data?

At this point, I have no faith in anything put out by the Executive branch on anything Snowden or NSA related. It's a disinformation campaign meant to discredit the source and bury their problems rather than address anything. They've been proven liars again and again.

I'd vote anyone seriously running on a campaign of gutting the NSA and the cult of secrecy built up since 2001.

Ok, I'll ask the question. Why did a contractor at Dell have access to this kind of information?

He was providing support for the servers that contained the documents?

In any case, this makes Snowden look more like a criminal than a hero if he was in fact stealing private file data from a customer's machine.

Why were they storing top secret data in a server serviced by Dell technicians, and in a form that those technicians could decrypt? No matter Snowden's actions, seems pretty fishy.

On that note, the biggest argument against the NSA's safeguards against abuse is that Snowden was able to access any of the things he accessed. He shouldn't have had access, and even if he did, alarms should've started ringing when a new hire started accessing top-secret material. If a sysadmin can steal massive troves of documents, and you don't know until they're in a newspaper, something is extremely wrong about your security safeguards.

He would have been a civilian contractor working for Dell under contract with the NSA. He would have needed the same vetting and security clearance as any contractor that would work with secret or top secret data. The government doesn't personally employ everyone that has security clearance.

Why Booz Allen Hamilton fired 90% of their administrators ? Did they los all government contracts or they had to vent their anger on some innocent people. Hey, Nazis used to shoot entire villages if one farmer was caught hiding a Jew.

The sentence that said they fired them is a link to the article explaining it in detail

He would have been a civilian contractor working for Dell under contract with the NSA. He would have needed the same vetting and security clearance as any contractor that would work with secret or top secret data. The government doesn't personally employ everyone that has security clearance.

Ah, makes sense. I was envisioning the NSA being "just another customer" at some Dell datacenter and the techs not necessarily knowing what servers they were working with.

At this point, I have no faith in anything put out by the Executive branch on anything Snowden or NSA related. It's a disinformation campaign meant to discredit the source and bury their problems rather than address anything. They've been proven liars again and again.

I'd vote anyone seriously running on a campaign of gutting the NSA and the cult of secrecy built up since 2001.

I agree 100% -- but the problem is that the America public eats up this type of information. They're more interested in the fact that he had an attractive girlfriend who's a pole dancer, and is now in Russia (Communism!), rather than about how their .gov is trampling their Rights.

Ok, I'll ask the question. Why did a contractor at Dell have access to this kind of information?

He was providing support for the servers that contained the documents?

In any case, this makes Snowden look more like a criminal than a hero if he was in fact stealing private file data from a customer's machine.

It doesn't detract from the information contained in what he released, not one bit.

The more of this stuff that comes out, the more obvious it is they're trying to make the narrative about discrediting Snowden as opposed to the information contained in the leaks.

The ends cannot justify the means.

Theft is theft. If the documents/files Snowden stole contained merely personal medical files, or credit reports, and not secret NSA documents... would it still be acceptable?

Rounding up a group people and indiscriminately killing them is not justified by learning after the fact that you managed to kill several highly wanted terrorists or mass murderers.

Rounding up an entire country's telecommunications data and indiscriminately analyzing it is not justified by learning after the fact that you managed to potentially intercept a half cocked terrorist plot.

Ok, I'll ask the question. Why did a contractor at Dell have access to this kind of information?

He was providing support for the servers that contained the documents?

In any case, this makes Snowden look more like a criminal than a hero if he was in fact stealing private file data from a customer's machine.

It doesn't detract from the information contained in what he released, not one bit.

The more of this stuff that comes out, the more obvious it is they're trying to make the narrative about discrediting Snowden as opposed to the information contained in the leaks.

The ends cannot justify the means.

Theft is theft. If the documents/files Snowden stole contained merely personal medical files, or credit reports, and not secret NSA documents... would it still be acceptable?

Rounding up a group people and indiscriminately killing them is not justified by learning after the fact that you managed to kill several highly wanted terrorists or mass murderers.

Rounding up an entire country's telecommunications data and indiscriminately analyzing it is not justified by learning after the fact that you managed to potentially intercept a half cocked terrorist plot.

I think that's a zing, right there.

And for all the surveillance being done, it hasn't stopped all plots either. So, in the end, is it worth it?

Ok, I'll ask the question. Why did a contractor at Dell have access to this kind of information?

He was providing support for the servers that contained the documents?

In any case, this makes Snowden look more like a criminal than a hero if he was in fact stealing private file data from a customer's machine.

It doesn't detract from the information contained in what he released, not one bit.

The more of this stuff that comes out, the more obvious it is they're trying to make the narrative about discrediting Snowden as opposed to the information contained in the leaks.

The ends cannot justify the means.

Theft is theft. If the documents/files Snowden stole contained merely personal medical files, or credit reports, and not secret NSA documents... would it still be acceptable?

Rounding up a group people and indiscriminately killing them is not justified by learning after the fact that you managed to kill several highly wanted terrorists or mass murderers.

Rounding up an entire country's telecommunications data and indiscriminately analyzing it is not justified by learning after the fact that you managed to potentially intercept a half cocked terrorist plot.

Agreed. But if the ends don't justify the means, the ends don't justify the means. Too many people on both sides of this are trying to only hold the other side to that standard.If the ends don't justify the means, then it is wrong no matter who does.

Ok, I'll ask the question. Why did a contractor at Dell have access to this kind of information?

He was providing support for the servers that contained the documents?

In any case, this makes Snowden look more like a criminal than a hero if he was in fact stealing private file data from a customer's machine.

It doesn't detract from the information contained in what he released, not one bit.

The more of this stuff that comes out, the more obvious it is they're trying to make the narrative about discrediting Snowden as opposed to the information contained in the leaks.

The ends cannot justify the means.

Theft is theft. If the documents/files Snowden stole contained merely personal medical files, or credit reports, and not secret NSA documents... would it still be acceptable?

Rounding up a group people and indiscriminately killing them is not justified by learning after the fact that you managed to kill several highly wanted terrorists or mass murderers.

Rounding up an entire country's telecommunications data and indiscriminately analyzing it is not justified by learning after the fact that you managed to potentially intercept a half cocked terrorist plot.

I am not saying what the NSA is/was doing is right.

Picking and choosing when to enforce the laws of the land only stands to weaken the rule of law.

A dogmatic adherence to laws, devoid of all context, is not what anyone wants. Would you maintain that a person should be charged with vandalism if they broke a window to pull some kids out of a burning school?

Picking and choosing when to enforce the laws of the land only stands to weaken the rule of law.

I can agree with you on this point, but without that information being released, there'd be no way we'd ever have something resembling this level of public awareness and discussion. Even if all this does is manage to block the states secrets excuse in court cases, I think it's a net positive. Do I think what he did was right? No. Am I happy he did it? Yes.

It almost feels like this exercise has been a return to power/oversight for the 4th estate.

Ok, I'll ask the question. Why did a contractor at Dell have access to this kind of information?

He was providing support for the servers that contained the documents?

In any case, this makes Snowden look more like a criminal than a hero if he was in fact stealing private file data from a customer's machine.

It doesn't detract from the information contained in what he released, not one bit.

The more of this stuff that comes out, the more obvious it is they're trying to make the narrative about discrediting Snowden as opposed to the information contained in the leaks.

The ends cannot justify the means.

Theft is theft. If the documents/files Snowden stole contained merely personal medical files, or credit reports, and not secret NSA documents... would it still be acceptable?

Rounding up a group people and indiscriminately killing them is not justified by learning after the fact that you managed to kill several highly wanted terrorists or mass murderers.

Theft is indeed theft, yet how often do you see such a concerted effort to catch a single thief, with so many levels of government doing everything they can to put the focus entirely on the thief?

If a thief steals a little cocaine from a previously unknown drug kingpin, highlighting the fact that there is a massive drug operation going on, the thief is still a thief, but we probably should pay a little attention to the drug problem. If that thief is a former employee turned whistleblower, you can probably expect them not to serve a particularly large amount of time in prison either.

Why Booz Allen Hamilton fired 90% of their administrators ? Did they los all government contracts or they had to vent their anger on some innocent people. Hey, Nazis used to shoot entire villages if one farmer was caught hiding a Jew.

The sentence that said they fired them is a link to the article explaining it in detail

Picking and choosing when to enforce the laws of the land only stands to weaken the rule of law.

I can agree with you on this point, but without that information being released, there'd be no way we'd ever have something resembling this level of public awareness and discussion. Even if all this does is manage to block the states secrets excuse in court cases, I think it's a net positive. Do I think what he did was right? No. Am I happy he did it? Yes.

It almost feels like this exercise has been a return to power/oversight for the 4th estate.

Gov desperately want to make this affair all about Snowden by using words such as traitor, in order to deflect attention from the heart of the matter which is illegal wiretapping and en-masse information grab by the NSA.

Articles such as this only reinforce that strategy.

Why report on this? It has nothing to do with the fact that NSA is blatantly breaking the law and lying about it? That's literally a million times worse than some kid breaching his employment contract or NDA and copying some Dell files onto a thumbdrive. BFD.

Picking and choosing when to enforce the laws of the land only stands to weaken the rule of law.

I can agree with you on this point, but without that information being released, there'd be no way we'd ever have something resembling this level of public awareness and discussion. Even if all this does is manage to block the states secrets excuse in court cases, I think it's a net positive. Do I think what he did was right? No. Am I happy he did it? Yes.

It almost feels like this exercise has been a return to power/oversight for the 4th estate.

So I can agree that Snowden stole data. Fine. He stole data. That's illegal. Snowden is a thief.

But if we're going to acknowledge that, we need to acknowledge the context and content of what he *stole.* There was no "debate" on these programs. There was no public vetting. If you've followed the case, you're aware that the current system is designed, at every level, to preserve secrecy and prevent precisely this kind of public conversation. It is overseen by a handful of people. The FISC judges are appointed by a single man.

I cannot, in good conscience, call a man "traitor" when he is responsible for exposing one of the most fundamentally unconstitutional programs of the past sixty years. Even if everything the NSA has done was perfectly justifiable, the safeguards and rules surrounding that system are shrouded and have already changed dramatically without notification over the past 12 years. There is no *systemic* guarantee that this will not occur in the future. There are simply the policy decisions of leaders at the time. And that's not good enough.

Our legal code is written in a way that acknowledges many differences of intent and of outcome. That's why deliberately and maliciously killing someone is murder, while accidentally killing someone can result in a criminal charge of involuntary manslaughter, a non-conviction, or a civil "wrongful death." It is not sufficient to say "Snowden is a thief and deserves to be punished." Not when the magnitude of what has been revealed is so enormous and the punishments levied against him are equally weighty.

Regarding how Dell may have had access to the same data Booz Allen Hamilton had:

Dell is a very large IT services company. Dell doesn't just provide and support hardware, they have several software products, and they also offer managed services for helpdesk support and systems administration.

It's not hard to imagine that Dell was providing the same kind of services that Booz Allen Hamilton provides to the NSA. That is, contract systems administration.

There's no information in this article that says what kind of work he was doing at Dell, so I suppose anyone's conjecture is as good as mine, but it would certainly explain why he had access to the same kinds of data.

Ok, I'll ask the question. Why did a contractor at Dell have access to this kind of information?

He was providing support for the servers that contained the documents?

In any case, this makes Snowden look more like a criminal than a hero if he was in fact stealing private file data from a customer's machine.

It doesn't detract from the information contained in what he released, not one bit.

The more of this stuff that comes out, the more obvious it is they're trying to make the narrative about discrediting Snowden as opposed to the information contained in the leaks.

The ends cannot justify the means.

Theft is theft. If the documents/files Snowden stole contained merely personal medical files, or credit reports, and not secret NSA documents... would it still be acceptable?

Rounding up a group people and indiscriminately killing them is not justified by learning after the fact that you managed to kill several highly wanted terrorists or mass murderers.

Rounding up an entire country's telecommunications data and indiscriminately analyzing it is not justified by learning after the fact that you managed to potentially intercept a half cocked terrorist plot.

I am not saying what the NSA is/was doing is right.

Picking and choosing when to enforce the laws of the land only stands to weaken the rule of law.

Maybe you're no good at reading between the lines, but what I read is that the "customer" is indeed a government agency. Likely the NSA, CIA, FBI, or etc. It's silly to imply he shouldn't have done what he's done because he broke some rules in doing so. Doubly so when the rules are set up by those breaking other rules to keep their own rule-breaking out of the light of day.

And how, pray-tell, do we have any rule of law when they decide their rules and laws in secret courts. The details of these things cannot even come out in a court of law, because the gag orders these secret courts put in place are so strict that the people affected cannot even share the details with their own legal council.

Just because the crime he committed exposed something that was also wrong does not mean he should escape justice.

Why not? If justice is a set of scales, as is often represented, wouldn't they be tipped heavily in his favor?

No. It he didn't commit a crime they would be tipped heavily in his favor. Justice isn't a "who was worse" competition. This is why vigilantism is against the law. If you go out and kill someone who is a murderer you are not let off because that person was worse, you still must face justice.

Just because the crime he committed exposed something that was also wrong does not mean he should escape justice.

Why not? If justice is a set of scales, as is often represented, wouldn't they be tipped heavily in his favor?

So basically the ends justifies the means. No. Never. If this ever came to trial he would be charged with theft, but I'm pretty sure the judge would be quite lenient based upon what was stolen and how it benefited society. Like geoken said, laws are not followed dogmatically, there's lots of grey in the sentencing and application of them.

Just because the crime he committed exposed something that was also wrong does not mean he should escape justice.

Why not? If justice is a set of scales, as is often represented, wouldn't they be tipped heavily in his favor?

No. It he didn't commit a crime they would be tipped heavily in his favor. Justice isn't a "who was worse" competition. This is why vigilantism is against the law. If you go out and kill someone who is a murderer you are not let off because that person was worse, you still must face justice.

You seem to have a rather narrow definition of justice.

The reality is that he may never have to face the judicial system in the United States, that's true. Who's to say he'd find justice in a court in the US? He's absolutely paying for his decision, and so is the NSA and our federal government. Justice is being served quite well as far as I'm concerned.

Incidentally, the abuses that he exposed are crimes as well. They're crimes that are illegal to expose, and that were protected from the whistleblower channels. It's interesting that you don't acknowledge that either in favor of your black and white assessment.

Just because the crime he committed exposed something that was also wrong does not mean he should escape justice.

Why not? If justice is a set of scales, as is often represented, wouldn't they be tipped heavily in his favor?

No. It he didn't commit a crime they would be tipped heavily in his favor. Justice isn't a "who was worse" competition. This is why vigilantism is against the law. If you go out and kill someone who is a murderer you are not let off because that person was worse, you still must face justice.

"When you break a law you must be willing to accept the consequences."

I agree with you, as far as the person breaking the law should be aware of what it may cost them. But I do not agree that the consequences, in all cases, are actually *just.* A law that says: "People who steal a nickel get their hands chopped off" may be legal, but it is grossly disproportionate to the nature of the crime.

I do not see Snowden as a hero, or a celebrity, but I see no reason why he should serve jail time. "Grossly inconveniencing, embarrassing, and catching the government in its own web of lies by exposing an unconstitutional abuse of power" should not be a crime.

Just because the crime he committed exposed something that was also wrong does not mean he should escape justice.

Why not? If justice is a set of scales, as is often represented, wouldn't they be tipped heavily in his favor?

So basically the ends justifies the means. No. Never. If this ever came to trial he would be charged with theft, but I'm pretty sure the judge would be quite lenient based upon what was stolen and how it benefited society. Like geoken said, laws are not followed dogmatically, there's lots of grey in the sentencing and application of them.

The ends quite often justify the means, I'm not sure you understand the phrase.

In this particular situation, I'd say they justify the means quite nicely.